I've run across specialized commercial software that was poor design and had bugs in it as well. One case was lighting control software that had a bug that wiped out the whole configuration if you didn't click buttons in a certain order. The mfg knew about it and their people knew the work-around. They weren't going to ever fix it because they had contracted someone outside the company to write the software and that person and any documentation was long gone.

More than likely all "non-gaming" software is probably written by those "lessor" authors the original poster was talking about, except of course for the ones that use "1" and "0" and toggle in the code that way, no HEX, but BINARY only! Only "lessor" authors will use HEX! Believe it or not, some did use "1" and "0", then an address increment. That is how I learned to program-- way back when-- on an old 8080 system, in the 70's or 80's. No GUIs then, just pure code!

I've used CNC machine equipment that had software written in Linix that work far better and more reliable than any ham software I've sampled to date. I'm unimpressed with ham software in general. Amateur, is the correct name to describe the stuff. I've used the "free Deluxe" software, it works ok, and I have no plan to ever pay for any ham software in the future. As I said, the sampled software is unimpressive to me. Time for me to spin my VFO knob off this topic...

Well that is good news then! Why? Because you will not feel justified in carping further about free software provided to you by the "lessor" authors, just get out that old wallet and start firing out cash as if you own a cash shotgun, BLAM BLAM BLAM!! Oh wait-- you have already done that and did not like the for pay software either... Guess you will have to dust off those old software coding books and get busy and write some software yourself.

Wait-- here is a novel idea, just be kind to the folks that offer their creations to you for free, tell them "THANK YOU", and move on, or just avert your eyes, look away, and move on... My God, they offer it free, and people carp about it. Where has civility gone in this country?

As an aside, I am not sure I see the connection between my post about compilers, and your post about bad software. It's almost as if you were just looking for a reason to carp about something which was given to you free, but that can't be it can it? Just say thanks to them, or don't take the free stuff...

The OP seems to weigh in on the look of Fldigi rather than its functionality. The look is due to the use of the FLTK graphics toolkit that allows for the same source code to be built and run on OS/X, Windows, Linux distributions. It also allows for using the same program on those platforms which softens the learning curve when moving from one to another. So an FLTK program doesn't look quite like anything else, so what? Fldigi does quite a lot, in fact I've barely ever scratched the surface of its capabilities. Plus it offers those capabilities in a UI that is rather straightforward and at a price that can't be beat.

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